Terry Murray Juggles…The Defensive Pairings?

The Kings will have new-look defensive pairs tomorrow against Anaheim, as Drew Doughty pairs with Jack Johnson, Willie Mitchell pairs with Slava Voynov and Rob Scuderi pairs with Matt Greene. Terry Murray said he liked the familiarity that Mitchell and Voynov had earlier this season and wanted to stay with it.

You can see why Terry Murray is doing this. It is one part Mitchell & Voynov’s chemistry, two parts Doughty and Johnson’s penchants for offense and three parts the need for a shut down pair to balance part two. Drew Doughty & Jack Johnson are arguably akin to chocolate frosting on chocolate cake (Surly used up the monthly quota of porn and religious analogies in his last post) and come with some potential defensive limitations, especially Doughty it seems recently.

On the fourth line, Rich stated:

Jonathan Quick will start in goal tomorrow an Murray said he hadn’t yet decided on a goalie for Thursday. The Kings are expected to stay with a fourth line of Ethan Moreau, Colin Fraser and Trevor Lewis, meaning Brad Richardson and Kevin Westgarth would be healthy scratches. Dustin Penner was on the ice late in practice again today in a no-contact jersey, skating and doing some shooting. More notes and quotes from practice to come…

Forgive my sigh. Hunter should not play in Richardson’s stead. Can I get a boo…

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… This could either work out very well, or disastrously. I’m going to get a kick out of all the Doughty-haters blaming Drew for Jack’s defensive mistakes, or giving Jack all of the credit if the pairing is successful. It’ll be fun.

HUGE BIG FIGGIN BOO!!!!!
Not right.. Richie is deserviing .. rent a player is not..
I am not so excited to see Doughts and JJ paired up.. they are fine for the PP but
I think we could have potential probs with them as a regular duo..
Fearful of some dumb out of positon play occuring..
And yes please make me Wrong and delussional..
GO KINGS GO!!!

If Pens is shooting the Puck his hand is not that tweaked. Sounds like a good excuse to put Loktionov there. Richards said that he’s hard working and sees the ice well. Didn’t say anything like that for Pens.

If anyone should be coming out, I’d think it would be Lewis. Lewis is probably our second best PK’er outside of Richards, but the guy has the stoniest hands of stone I’ve ever seen.

Although Richardson hasn’t been chasing 90 goals himself, he seems to use his speed and tenacity on the forecheck to create much more offensively than Lewis.

As far as Hunter, I’ve always liked him, and I think he’s gonna start showing that he’s a very quality bottom 6 winger. He is consistently solid defensively, although I can’t lie, I see his offensive output this season turning into another casualty of this strongly defensive minded system, which I don’t see him getting to 20 again, to be honest. Probably this year’s version of Poni. Just much cheaper, and with much lighter expectations.

I don’t know if I’m that disappointed to see Richardson sit. Not in love with Hunter but Richardson just isn’t that intriguing anymore. He killes penalties, yeah, but I’m just like whatever give someone else a chance to show what they can do.

My pros and cons.
Williams and Voynov– I love this. I love this more than Takeshi Miike, Brandy Talore and 3×3’s from In-n-Out and I’m a chunky, boob obsessed japan-o-phile.

Doughty and Johnson… sounds sexy, but two D who love to jump up in the rush could get risky. Especially when you play a team that likes the long pass and has talented goal scorers(that’s the second Ducks compliment I’ve been cornered in to making today, I’m gonna go punch myself in the nuts fo penance.) Doughty is not afraid of taking risky chances and when it works, we love him, when it don’t– we scream at thr TV about his beer league antics. Just hope team communicates and positions are covered.

I think Murray feels the pressure for more scoring so having Doughty / Johnson out there only further demonstrates that theory. And being as (presumably) they will play a majority of their time with the 1st and 2nd line (scoring lines), this looks like a ploy for more offensive production.

My memory us that the doughty/Johnson pairing has been a failure every time Its been tried at 5-on-5. 4-on-4 and PP its great, but I’m very skeptical. Tho Johnson’s improvement This season makes me less nervous.